With the temperature reaching 90 degrees with high humidity, Georgia Tech slogged through a draining afternoon practice Tuesday.
“It was humid,” coach Paul Johnson said. “This might have been the worst one.”
Johnson didn’t see the resolve that he was hoping to see from his team, which will start the season with two games likely to be played in similar conditions, at home Sept. 1 against Alcorn State and Sept. 8 at South Florida in Tampa. The Alcorn State game starts at 12:30 p.m., and the USF game is a noon kickoff.
Asked how the team responded, Johnson responded, “Not very well. (Tuesday) was a get-over-the-hump day. We struggled with it. We’ve got a lot of guys beat up, banged up. (Wednesday) is two weeks of camp. This is kind of the doldrums – the rest of this week and next week and then it picks up when you get into game week.”
Johnson schedules practice for the afternoon to replicate game conditions.
“You want to play in the conditions you’re going to play in,” he said.
It has been a test for players.
“I know what camp feels like now,” said sophomore safety Tariq Carpenter, who was injured during camp last year. “Last year, I was on the ‘beach.’ (The team’s nickname for the training area for injured players.) The beach was hard, but out here, in the pads and the sun every day, the beach has nothing on that.”
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